Offer your dissent

Monthly Archives: October 2013

When the Nazis took over Austria, Sister Maria Restituta (1894-1943) was very vocal in her opposition. “A Viennese cannot keep her mouth shut,” she said.

Blessed Maria Restituta

Sister Restituta was a nurse. She hung a crucifix in every room in the hospital where she worked. The Nazis demanded the crosses be taken down. She refused. She also spread “A Soldier’s Song,” which spoke of democracy, peace, and a free Austria. (I cannot find the lyrics to this song in English. Please send if you have them!)

She was eventually arrested and sentenced to death by the guillotine for “favoring the enemy and conspiracy to commit high treason.” The Nazis thought her execution would provide effective intimidation for others who might want to resist. She was beheaded on 30 March 1943 at the age of 48.

On June 21, 1998, she was beatified in Vienna. Pope John Paul II said: “Many things can be taken from us Christians. But we will not let the Cross as a sign of salvation be taken from us. We will not let it be removed from public life! We will listen to the voice of our conscience, which says: ‘We must obey God rather than men’ (Acts 5:29).”

Here are five takeaways from Democracy Now’s interview with ex-Air Force Pilot Brian Bryanton. He worked as a sensor operator for the Predator program from 2007 to 2011. After he left the active duty in the Air Force, he was presented with a certificate that credited his squadron for 1,626 kills. He is now on a mission to “humanize” drone operators.

1. Drone operators are people too.

“My goal in all of this is to talk about, like, these aren’t killer robots. They’re not like unfeeling people behind this whole thing. There are—there are some people that are extremely scary when talking to them, and there was one individual who got the word ‘infidel’ tattooed in Arabic on his side, and he had Hellfire tattoos marking every shot. But that’s an extreme. …And that’s an extreme personality. But there’s a lot of like—those people are so few in the community, so few in the military, that—but they’re looked at as like that’s who everyone is. And that’s not the case. Like, there’s people behind there…”

2. Drone operators are real killers who deserve our respect.

“…Because there’s so much misinformation out there, that—so much speculation, and—and that’s wrong. The United States government hasn’t really done a good job of humanizing the people that do it. And everyone else thinks that the whole program or the people behind it are a joke, that we are video-game warriors, that we’re Nintendo warriors. And that’s—that’s really not the case. And these—the people that do the job are just as legit and just as combat-oriented as anyone else.”

3. The American public wanted the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and they were constitutional wars. (Just keep repeating something enough and it becomes true, right?) The American public wanted the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. They were constitutional wars. The American public wanted the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. They were constitutional wars. The American public wanted the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. They were constitutional wars.

“And, like, you have to understand that what we did over in Afghanistan and Iraq there, it’s constitutionally viable. We were given permission by the American public to go to war with al-Qaeda and the Taliban.”

4. The real debate here isn’t about the wars themselves (because the American people wanted them and they were constitutional) or about using drones to kill people in wars or about using drones to kill people in countries we’re not at war with or about the number of innocent people who are killed by drones or about the methods and intelligence used to determine who gets targeted or about the psychological effect of remote control killing. No. We should only care about the people killed by drones if those people are Americans.

“And the real—the real debate should be about places other than where we went to war and, you know, violating the constitutional rights of an American citizen who was in another country, who was killed without due process, and that type of thing.”

4. The hardest part of being a drone killer is that it violates your morals. But it is not the killing of other human beings that violates your morals. That’s pretty much a non-issue in this interview. The hardest part of being a drone killer is the “moral injury” suffered when you feel like you violated the Constitution.

“And my deal is more moral injury, like think of it—think how you would feel when—if you were part of something that you felt violated the Constitution. And, I mean, I swore an oath, you know? I swore to defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. And how do you feel if, like—you can’t use ‘I obeyed orders’ as an excuse. It’s ‘I obeyed the Constitution, regardless of lawful or unlawful orders.’ And lawful orders follow the Constitution. And that, that’s the hardest part.”

(Yet, he already said that the wars were constitutional. What is he trying to say, exactly, in this interview?)

5. Don’t worry. If you think a child might have been killed by a drone strike, it’s probably just a dog.

I don’t know what the point of this interview was or what the point of his “speaking out” is. All I can say is that this kind of thing reminds me of something I read by Hannah Erendt , in which she pointed out that the Nazis were not totally unfeeling or completely hardened to what was going on during the Holocaust. But something in them had been twisted, and they took all of the compassion that would normally be felt for the victims of the Holocaust and channeled it towards the soldiers. “Oh, look what kinds of things these soldiers have to do. Look what horrible and grotesque things they have to see and experience and endure! Oh how awful it must be to have to live with that!” The soldiers were seen as the suffering servants of humanity; yet there was no compassion and empathy for the people whose lives, families, and communities were being systematically destroyed by the soldiers.

At the Mass, on Saturday, Nov. 9, at 4:30 p.m. at St. Pius X in Flint, MI, soldiers’ photos will be displayed in a PowerPoint slideshow, their names read aloud and candles lit by family members. The candles are in the shape of a flag with red, white and blue stars and stripes. There is nothing wrong with praying for any Catholic or any non-Catholic at a Mass. But this is another example of militaristic jingoism being dragged into the Church.

**** The following was written by Rev. Emmanuel Charles McCarthy and distributed on July 6, 2013. ***

This picture of Mary, the Mother of Jesus, the Mother of God, appeared in Summer 2013 on the front page of The Tablet, the paper of the Diocese of Brooklyn. It was also sent as a poster to every parish in Brooklyn and Queens, New York.

The flag of a nation is a symbol of a nation. A national flag is not and can never be a Christian symbol. The reason for this is that no nation-state is built on or teaches or lives according to the truths and values proclaimed by Jesus Christ as the Way and Will of God unto eternal salvation for each and all. The means and ends of a state are not now and never have been the means and ends of Jesus. Within any state a person can be a faithful Christian until the day he or she dies. But, no state is Christian just because it has Baptized Christians on the payroll or running the show.

For a Church or a Christian to wrap a Christian symbol in the symbol of a nation-state, e.g. a flag, is to generate spiritual cacophony in the souls of people and in the Church. It is to make unclear what is clear, namely, the empirical verifiability that the state does not live by the truths and values, the means and ends of Jesus. As the late Carl J. Friedrich, one of the world’s leading political scientists, friend and confidant of Henry Kissinger and former Eaton Professor of Government at Harvard University, wrote on the concluding page of his four hundred page book, The Pathology of Power: “Our analysis has, I hope, shown that politics needs all these dubious practices; it cannot be managed without violence, deceit, betrayal, corruption and propaganda.” To interlace a symbol of the reign of violence, deceit, betrayal, corruption with a symbol of the reign of God as proclaimed by the Jesus in the Gospels is to propagate untruth as truth. It is to breed evil under the auspices of good.

Whether this fusing of state symbols with Christian symbols is done out of ignorance, religious zeal or base motives, e.g., the lust for power and prestige, greed, cavalier indifference to truth, etc., the consequence is the same. Human beings are led toward the abyss of agony and destruction rather than the fullness of life in eternal communion with the Holy One. It is a terrible price that ordinary people pay—Christians and non-Christians— when the “Keepers of the Symbols” in the Church, the bishops and their clergy, merge contradictory symbols. Such an anschluss breeds evil under the canopy of the holy.

In large part, today in the U.S. Mary, the Mother of Jesus, is just another propaganda gimmick in the arsenal of deception at the disposal of American civil and ecclesiastical politicos. She has been equivalently misused before, e.g. in capitalist’s Church-State joint operations to attack communism and socialism. But, to the best my knowledge, never before has the Mother of Jesus been so audaciously exploited at this level of “Bush-Obama in-your-face, might-makes-right and there-is-nothing-you-can-do-about-it,” brazenness. I do not think that even the Orthodox Churches, for whom the idolatry of nationalism has been a long abiding evil and scandal have ever put a national flag around the Mother of God in an icon.

To pray with Mary to Jesus on behalf of people or on behalf of a group of people is fine. To pray for a cause is most appropriate, providing it is not in contradiction of the will of God as revealed by Jesus. But, to clothe the Blessed Mother of Jesus in the American flag, or any national flag, is evil because it communicates untruth as truth concerning the will of God for the salvation of the world as revealed by Jesus.

Would this have been an acceptable image of the Blessed Mother to have displayed in every parish of a diocese? If so, why so? If not, why not?

Today in the U.S. 25% of the adult population identifies itself as Catholic. 76% of the population says it is Christian. In the 1938 German census 40% of the adults identified themselves as Catholic and 58% identified themselves as Lutheran. Lutherans, like Catholics, have a theology and a spirituality that sees Mary as having a special place in the economy of salvation. Luther wrote a hundred and fifty tracts on the Blessed Mother of Jesus and supposedly died holding a rosary. So, I ask you, my reader, in 1938 when this was the official national flag of Germany, would this have been an acceptable image of Mary for a bishop to place on the front page of his diocesan German Catholic newspaper? Would this have been an acceptable image of the Blessed Mother to have displayed in every parish of a diocese? If so, why so? If not, why not?

Beware of the Orwellian Christian symbolism that is snaking its way—with the help of some very wealthy and politically powerful people and their chosen hierarchical puppets—into the increasingly militaristic and nationalistic U.S. Christian Churches.These ever more prevalent doublespeak symbols must not be taken lightly. They can be choice determining and “energy directing.” They are a real danger, indeed, an extreme personal, social and spiritual danger, to the Christian, for they point him or her or the Christian community in the wrong way on a one-Way highway.

“Moreover, man has a natural right to be respected. He has a right to his good name. He has a right to freedom investigating the truth, and–within the limits of the moral order and the common good–to freedom of speech and publication, and to freedom to pursue whatever profession he may choose. He has the right, also, to be informed about public events.” –Pope John XXIII, Pacem in Terris

Then, there is mysterious death of Michael Hastings, the journalist who ended General Stanley McChrystal’s career with his exposé in Rolling Stone and later wrote that he was threatened with death over it. His car crashed while he was working on an investigative piece about Michael Brennan, the head of the CIA. He had been telling his editor and others that the feds were investigating his “close friends and associates.”

St. John Houghton, O.Cart., by Francisco Zurbarán, (Spanish), (17th century)

This week in the news it is being reported that saying “So help me God” as part of their enlistment oaths may become optional for men and women enlisting in certain branches of the military. Christians are upset. It would be wise at this time to consider the dilemma and example of St. John Houghton.

Saint John Houghton (1486-1535) was a Carthusian hermit and the first English Catholic martyr. In 1534, he asked that he and his community be exempted from the oaths required by King Henry VIII of England under the new Act of Succession. Eventually, they were persuaded that the oath was consistent with their Catholicism, with the clause “as far as the law of Christ allows” and they returned to the Charterhouse, where (in the presence of a large armed force) the whole community made the required professions.

The next year the community was called upon to make the new oath. Again, Houghton pleaded for an exemption, but this time he and a few others were arrested, called before a special commission, and sentenced to death. John Houghton was the first to be executed. After he was hung, he was taken down alive, and the process of quartering him began. After his death, his body was chopped to pieces and hung in different parts of London. His feast day is October 25.

Federal law requires everyone who enlists or re-enlists in the Armed Forces of the United States to take the enlistment oath. Here is the oath:

I, (NAME), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.

Why do Christians not refuse to take this oath unless the following words are added?

I, (NAME), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice, so far as the law of Christ allows. So help me God.

Image from a promotional presentation for Urban Shield 2013. (Alameda County Sheriff’s Office)

“Between October 25 and 28 a major urban security training event and trade expo will invade Alameda County, Calif. Urban Shield, now in its seventh year, is a marketplace of repressive ideas and technologies…The stated goal of Urban Shield is to improve ‘regional disaster response capabilities,’ but rather than fostering community-focused crisis response, it presents a view of our ‘high-threat, high-density’ cities as always, already violent spaces. This vision of urban life dehumanizes and criminalizes public assembly and nonviolent protest.”

Andy Lopez was shot dead by a Santa Rosa police officer as he walked down the street carrying a pellet gun modeled on an assault rifle. Photograph: AP/The Press Democrat

The militaristic mentality creeping into our law enforcement agencies encourages “heroes” to see everyone as threat. “First Responders” starts to mean: “respond” (i.e. shoot) first, ask questions later. They feel entitled to “respond” with force at the slightest provocation. On October 22, thirteen-year-old Andy Lopez was shot and killed because he was carrying a toy BB gun. “The deputy’s mindset was that he was fearful that he was going to be shot.”

128. And yet, unhappily, we often find the law of fear reigning supreme among people and causing them to spend enormous sums on armaments. Their object is not aggression, so they say—and there is no reason for disbelieving them—but to deter others from aggression.

I love the part where it is written, “Their object is not aggression, or so they say…” A shield, of course, as in “UrbanShield,” is used only for protection, of course.

He’s five foot-two, and he’s six feet-four,He fights with missiles and with spears.He’s all of thirty-one, and he’s only seventeen,Been a soldier for a thousand years.

He’s a Catholic, a Hindu, an Atheist, a Jain,A Buddhist and a Baptist and a Jew.And he knows he shouldn’t kill,And he knows he always will,Kill you for me my friend and me for you.

And he’s fighting for Canada,He’s fighting for France,He’s fighting for the USA,And he’s fighting for the Russians,And he’s fighting for Japan,And he thinks we’ll put an end to war this way.

And he’s fighting for Democracy,He’s fighting for the Reds,He says it’s for the peace of all.He’s the one who must decide,Who’s to live and who’s to die,And he never sees the writing on the wall.

But without him,How would Hitler have condemned them at Dachau?Without him Caesar would have stood alone,He’s the one who gives his bodyAs a weapon of the war,And without him all this killing can’t go on.

He’s the Universal Soldier and he really is to blame,His orders come from far away no more,They come from here and there and you and me,And brothers can’t you see,This is not the way we put the end to war.